The present invention relates to laser apparatus and methods.
Standing-wave laser resonators and ring cavity resonators are both well known in the prior art. See, for example, the following U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,969,687 and 3,969,688 to Freiberg et al; and 4,135,787 to McLafferty. With respect to unidirectional ring cavity laser resonators, see Tang, Statz, and deMars, Jr., "Spectral output and spiking behavior of solid-state lasers," Journal of Applied Physics, Vol. 34, pp.2289-2295 (1963).